A Creative Signal

by justine

Currently, I have an obsession with Jad Abumrad, radio host and producer, founder and co-host of Radiolab(also here).

This creative person, his thoughts about what he does, and his execution of these ideas are all coming to me this month as I feel a swarm of creative ideas myself, ones that I’ve been pushing aside, even blatantly ignoring because lack of head space. Most attempts I made back in the spring fizzled. Conversations took place, but nothing was shipped.

The wedding and subsequent honeymoon needed to launch first. One thing at a time.

Now that I’m back (a month tomorrow), my mind is abuzz. There’s a definite video project to hash out via my job, blog ideas for here, video and photo recap of honeymoon and wedding, article ideas for another contact, blog ideas for work, a personal minibook, a presentation to be produced, and maybe the video project could also be a podcast…?

And I’ve realized two things about this swirling vortex of creativity bubbling under my being:

It’s all about telling stories: mine, yours, theirs

I need larger swatches of time to create than I’ve ever needed before

My approach is to map things out on paper, breaking things down into steps. Allowing myself to draft 300 words and let it sit. Organize photos for an hour, then stop. Work on something else then revisit. Take on one thing at a time, even one major task per day. This afternoon I transferred 8gigs of video to a fresh hard-drive.

Like all energies, I am riding this wave as far as I can take it. This doesn’t feel manic or anxious. It feels focused and productive. My goal: to complete at least one of these creative ideas before the momentum breaks.

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If you’re interested, here’s a few of my Jad Abumrad resources – I actually have yet to read the Transom article, but I plan to give myself another large swatch of time to do so soon.